


don't make me tongue tied

by kkamikaze



Series: college daze [2]
Category: Dear Evan Hansen - Pasek & Paul/Levenson
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Established Relationship, Fluff, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Slice of Life, again nothing happens but, cursing, everyone is over 18, for that one part, i'm a cheesy motherfucker!! step off!!!, love languages obligatory fic!!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-30
Updated: 2020-04-30
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:41:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,250
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23931730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kkamikaze/pseuds/kkamikaze
Summary: It was probably a little silly that Evan could have the same effect on Jared without even having to say anything, but. Here they were.(Or: love languages!)
Relationships: Evan Hansen & Jared Kleinman, Evan Hansen/Jared Kleinman
Series: college daze [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1725055
Comments: 10
Kudos: 84





	don't make me tongue tied

**Author's Note:**

> takes place in various points after [this](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23673268) ! you don't need to read that one first in order to get anything, buuuut

**i.**

“This is, like,” and Jared can _feel_ Evan laughing from where his head is currently resting on the other boy’s chest. “Like. This all gives me _Degrassi_ vibes, you know?” 

“Degrassi vibes.” 

“Yeah, yeah - you remember Degrassi, right?” 

“I - ” Jared laughs, mostly in part that Evan is having the revelation that The Secret Life of the American Teenager is somehow similar to Degrassi, but _only_ after they’ve watched more than half of the entire first season. Like it took him that long to come to this conclusion. Which, it’s not even a _right_ conclusion, really. “I remember, but _how?”_

“Hm?”

“How are they _similar?_ Just ‘cause they’re both in a high school?” 

“No - I mean, _yeah_ , but,“ He makes a face, trying to find the words. “The _premise_ . It’s pretty much just a weird, bad soap opera for pre-teens, right? And maybe moms? I’m not even going to give them the satisfaction of saying for _teens_ because I feel like even a teenager would watch this stuff and be, like, ‘what, what is even happening right now’.” He pauses a little, then adds, quietly, “and plot wise, it’s pretty similar to Degrassi too, and not _just_ because they both are in high school.” 

Jared is pretty sure he can accredit it to the fact that he’s more than smitten with this stupid kid, but there’s just. Something incredibly and stupidly endearing in hearing Evan talk about this with _any_ conviction. 

“An acceptable and much shorter answer could’ve been that they’re both bad,” Jared comments, entirely separate from those thoughts. Evan snorts above him. 

“You say that like we aren’t about to finish this entire season, Jared.” 

“You can say something’s bad but still _watch_ it, Evan.” Again, Evan makes a sort of dismissive sound above him at that. 

Someone (Adrian, Jared thinks her name is) is crying on screen now, and he doesn’t.. actually know why? He was kind of bad at talking to Evan and watching at the same time, which he figured was fairly reasonable. The context of what the other characters are talking about doesn’t really help him figure it out, either. 

“They also both won Teen’s Choice Awards,” He comments again after a second - mostly as a jab at the fact that the current scene was So Much and clearly a display of something that deserved a Teen Choice Award. Evan doesn’t say anything in return, and Jared figures that it’s because he’s ignoring him to keep watching, though he eventually glances up to see Evan looking at him, fighting a losing battle with a grin. 

“What?” Jared asks. 

“Why do you _know_ that?” 

Jared blinks. Opens his mouth but then closes it. Evan starts laughing above him again and Jared lightly smacks Evan’s shoulder. “Shut up, shut _up_ \- ”

“How are you going to call this bad but then know the _lore_?” 

“Knowing that it won an award isn’t _lore!_ ” He argues, but now he’s laughing too. 

———

“You know,” Jared calls from below. “I kind of hate that even after all these years you can still scale a fucking tree in, like. Eight seconds.” 

He can see Evan’s stupid smile even from several feet up in the air. He adjusts so he’s sitting on the branch, back pressed against the trunk of the tree, and looks down at Jared. 

“What? Are you jealous, or..?” 

“No, it just doesn’t add up.” Jared also doesn’t have the heart to tell him that he’s still - and he thinks _rightfully_ so - a little nervous about Evan being up in trees, even if the thing that happened was a little over three years ago, now. 

At the same time, though—

“Aww, it’s actually really pretty from up here..” Evan comments lightly, probably more so to himself, and despite himself Jared can’t help but smile, because he just. Sounds so sincere. 

Somewhere in here he could probably make a metaphor about, like. Growth, or something. Maybe if he was better at words. And maybe if Evan didn’t have to look like that just sitting contentedly up in a tree. 

Evan looks around a little more before eventually glancing back down at Jared. “This one’s actually - it’s easy to climb, you should come up here!” 

“You _really_ overestimate how athletic I am, Ev.” Jared says back, which. That’s not a lie. But, also: “And. I like this view, so. It’s fine.” 

That’s about the best he can do in terms of flirting without getting overly embarrassed, but thankfully it’s all he needs to do. Evan sort of just stares back at him for a second before looking away, and somehow he hears the bashful little _‘oh’_ Evan formulates in response, and it makes Jared laugh. 

Growth, or something. Right?

“Come on, I wanna keep walking.” 

“Alright, okay,” Evan says, and then he carefully makes his way back down the tree. 

His face is still a little red by the time he’s back down, though Jared knows that if he says anything Evan’s going to claim it was exertion from climbing down or something. Instead he just settles with taking a step towards him and flicking the leaf out of Evan’s hair. “You ready?” 

Evan watches the leaf twirl all the way down to the ground, before nodding. He reaches out for Jared’s hand without even looking at it, as if the action was thoughtless. “Mhm.”

And, well. It was probably a little silly that Evan could have the same effect on Jared without even having to _say_ anything, but. Here they were. 

Jared swings their hands a little as they start to walk again, and he feels Evan squeeze his hand every so often, accompanied by that dorky little look he gives Jared from the corner of his eye, and, like. 

It’s silly, being this fucking _whipped,_ but. Maybe it’s also growth that Jared’s just really okay with it. 

  
  
  
  


**ii.**

Jared feels like, at one point in his life, he definitely made fun of those nerds who had a hundred different pins stuck onto the front of their backpacks, trying to depict their entire character in the form of tacky little pieces of plastic.

At that same point in time, Jared was probably also much more of an asshole. And believe it or not, he’s really been working on that. 

All that’s to say is the front of Jared’s bag is very boring, and the more he sits in his Art History class staring at the front of Sabrina Patel’s backpack decorated with a different assortment of random pins that somehow makes its own aesthetic instead of listening to the professor read off of the Powerpoint slides, the more he wants to succumb to the voice telling him that he hardly qualifies as an adult as is, so what’s the harm in putting a couple of dumb pins on his bag? 

“Did you check The Union? They sell a bunch of random shit there, I don’t see how they _wouldn’t_ have pins,” Evan says from the other side of the kitchen. 

Jared scrunches up his nose, leaning back against the counter. “I mean, _no,_ but I feel like all the ones there would be, like. School related. And stupidly expensive.” 

The microwave starts to beep, which takes Evan’s attention for a minute, but eventually he closes the door and turns back to Jared with a newly attained bag of popcorn in his hand. “Yeah, I mean - that’s fair.” 

“What other place sells pins?” 

“You could look online?” Evan grins, shrugging. “Or if you’re brave enough, wander into a Hot Topic.” 

“Isn’t that where everyone _steals_ pins from?” 

“I don’t know?” Evan reaches up to open the cabinet above Jared’s head, and Jared resists the urge to, like. Poke him where his shirt is lifting up. For some reason. “I don’t steal pins in my free time.” 

“Then you’re no help to me _at all_.”

Evan pulls away with a bowl in his other hand now, shrugging. “Sorry.” He definitely doesn’t _sound_ very sorry, and he’s still smiling. Jerk. 

And honestly, Jared kind of thought that’d be the last of it. Or at the very least, the last of Evan being involved in his Pin Search - not that he was all that determined to get himself any pins, anyway, he just liked the idea in theory. He wasn’t sure he cared enough to go entirely out of his way for it. 

However, it was a couple of days after, long after he’d forgotten that he’d even talked to Evan about it. He heard the door to their apartment open downstairs, and a few moments later Evan was peeking into their room. 

Jared glances up at him from where he was laying sideways on their bed, scrolling idly through Reddit on his phone. “Hey.” 

“Hi,” Evan says back, almost.. shyly? Jared raises an eyebrow at him. 

“What did you do?” 

Evan chokes, immediately losing some of the tension. “I - _nothing,_ why would I have done something?” 

“I don’t know,” Jared sort of looks him up and down before rolling over so he was laying on his stomach instead of his back. “What’s up?” 

Evan blinks a couple of times before taking a step actually into their room. Jared immediately notes the little plastic bin he’s holding at his side. 

“Okay, so,” Evan starts, and again, that nervous energy is kind of back. “Um. You were talking about pins the other day.” 

Pins. Jared has to remember that he did in fact talk to Evan about pins. He nods, slowly. “Right..?” 

“Right. So.” Evan sits on the edge of the bed and sets the bin in between them. Takes a breath. “I have this friend in my Ornithology class? She’s working on moving out of her parents’ house right now, so she’s been trying to get rid of a lot of stuff.” He fiddles restlessly with the edge of the lid on the bin. “She - I guess she used to collect pins? She was talking to me about it. She doesn’t, anymore, and she never, like. Actually put them on anything. She just collected a bunch of them for fun.” 

Jared glances between Evan, and then the bin. When he looks up at Evan again, he’s flushing a little, trying to look at something that pointedly isn’t Jared. “I bought them off of her for, like. Eight bucks. So.” 

Jared hesitates before reaching out and tugging the bin close enough to him that he can pop the lid off. Sure enough, there are quite a few pins inside. Like, enough that it looks like a bin that someone would see at a store or something. 

“It’s - they’re all pretty random, I guess? So there might. They probably won’t all be something you’d actually want to use.” 

“I dunno, dude, I can already tell I relate to a bunch of these,” Jared says, pulling out the first pin that catches his eye, which of course happens to be a My Little Pony one. 

That manages to make Evan laugh a little. “Oh, well. Clearly.” 

They end up picking through the bin together - and Evan was right, the sheer random assortment of pins makes it clear that some of them definitely aren’t for him. (“I can guarantee that some of these are stolen Hot Topic pins. There’s _no_ way.” “She really doesn’t give off that vibe, but alright.”) A few of them, though, are stupid enough that he absolutely _has_ to keep them (namely: one that says ‘my cat is a democrat’, one that has a cheesy obligatory ‘I’m _kind_ of a big deal’ line that you’d see on like, a fourteen year old girl’s shirt, and one with a few cartoon eggs and a rabbit on it that says ‘silly rabbit, Easter is for Jesus’). 

After, like, twentyish minutes, they have a little collection of deemed Usable Pins. There weren't a ton of them, but the ones they _did_ have seemed aesthetically appropriate and filled up enough space on the front of his bag that it didn’t look empty or bare. 

“That looks nice, actually,” Evan comments when they’re done, and Jared hums his approval as he sits back enough to examine the bag. 

“It’s exactly what I wanted it to be,” he said with a dutiful nod, before glancing at Evan, offering him a sideways grin. “I.. didn’t actually think you were taking me seriously when I was talking about them.” 

Evan puts the lid back on their remaining pins. “Really? Why wouldn’t I?”

Jared.. kind of blanks on why, actually. So he just shrugs, deciding he wanted to look at the bag again. “Oh, I mean.. I dunno.”

“I don’t know what you think, but I _do_ listen to you most of the time,” Evan says, kind of nudging Jared’s leg with the back of his hand before standing up from the bed. Jared watches him go.

Something about what he just said and the late-hitting sentiment of him buying Jared a bunch of dumb pins just because Jared mentioned it offhandedly _once_ really. Kind of. Huh. 

“Thank you,” he eventually manages, belatedly, after Evan was almost out of their room. He glances back at him, offering a small grin. 

“Oh, yeah, of course,” he replies, before actually heading out. Jared listens to his footsteps fade all the way back downstairs before giving the bag another glance. 

If it looks tacky, he somehow cares even less than he did before. 

  
  
  


**iii.**

The subway was the worst. A universal fact, really, but Jared felt like that sentiment was even more strongly felt being someone who didn’t live in the city and who had a car and therefore drove most places, and in such only used the subway when he freaking _had_ to. 

Of course, sometimes he had to put sheer convenience over his hatred of the subway system. Usually when roads were stupidly congested around campus it was easier to just walk there, which was what he and Evan did, but when that problem persisted to anywhere _further_ than campus, walking was less suitable as an option. Hence submitting to the subway. 

So he hated it for obvious reasons, but he also hated it in part because it stressed Evan out so much too. Understandably. 

College hadn’t _cured_ Evan’s anxiety or anything, but he’d definitely gotten a lot better around people and crowds in general since their three years out of high school. He still had his moments or his days where it felt like they were juniors in high school as opposed to college with Evan being so anxious that just existing in his own skin looked like it was a challenge, but for the most part he’d gotten a lot better at just.. functioning without having to worry/think too much about it. 

There was something about the subway though - Jared didn’t know if it was the amount of people or just the general uncomfortable vibe that taking the subway gave off - but it was kind of a lot. It made Evan sort of regress almost, or at the very least it set him off kilter for the rest of the day afterward.

Thankfully they usually never have to be on it for long, but. Still. Jared felt kinda bad every time he had to break the news that if they drove they’d be late and that they couldn’t walk because it was too far. 

And of course, with their luck, it seems like today they hopped on the express at the busiest fucking time, because the car is pretty much full when they step on. Without really thinking about it, Jared reaches behind him to take Evan’s wrist and carefully navigates them to the back where the least amount of people are. It’s still crowded, and they both still have to stand, but it’s much better than literally anywhere else. He lets go of his wrist once they stop to grab the pole instead, but Evan still stays close to him.

“It’s five stops,” Jared tells him a couple of seconds after the doors slide shut and the train starts to move, and Evan nods tensely and mouths ‘thank you’. 

Because it’s always too loud for them to just talk, they end up dealing with their discomfort in different ways. When they can sit Jared usually just resorts to fucking around on his phone, but times like this he either disassociates or focuses way too hard on how many stops they have left. The latter obviously makes the train ride feel like it’s centuries longer, but it’s much harder to tune out when there’s a hundred different conversations happening around him. He’s already way too aware of things happening _normally,_ when they _aren’t_ on an overcrowded subway car. 

The train stops and the doors open with a ding. People shuffle off, the same number of people end up getting on. The doors shut. Ding. Four more stops. 

For a few minutes his attention floats between watching this older dude standing several feet away holding a pole almost fall asleep while standing multiple times, and a girl sitting near the door shuffling frantically through her messenger bag much to the annoyance of the woman sitting next to her. It ends abruptly when the dude holding the pole ends up catching him staring and gives Jared some kind of look, and Jared immediately drops his gaze to his feet and resists the urge to smack his head into the pole. 

Ding. Shuffling feet. Evan uncomfortably clears his throat next to him. Ding. Three more stops. 

Jared eventually pulls his eyes back up from the ground and glances over at Evan. His eyes are trained at nothing in particular on the ground in front of them, and Jared can see that he’s biting the inside of his cheek. Every so often he hard-blinks. 

Jared is pretty sure his visible distress is only upsetting to see because it’s just. Uncannily reminiscent of how he idled when they were younger. 

He kind of watches him for a second with a frown, before he reaches out and sort of brushes his knuckles against Evan’s. 

Evan recoils at the contact at first before his gaze snaps up to Jared. Who tries to give him a hopefully empathetic look of ‘yeah, this fucking sucks dude, I know’. 

PDA is kind of weird for both of them - they aren’t overtly casually affectionate really just in general (or not in the ways that are conventional, anyway), so being that way in public just feels kind of artificial and strange, and even if it _wasn’t_ that way he’s pretty sure if he were to hold Evan’s hand or something right now that’d only stress him out more. People might look. Evan’s already nervous so his hands are already sweaty and if Jared holds his hand that will make it even _more_ sweaty. Some other Evanism. 

This seems to work its intended purpose, anyway. Evan glances down at his hand and then back up at him, and this expression sort of softens, just a little. He reaches out and bumps Jared’s hand back. 

Ding. 

“Two more,” Jared murmurs, and Evan nods. 

———

So Jared might’ve exaggerated some when he’d talked about his body count in the past. 

To be more frank, anything over zero was an exaggeration. 

He’s obviously kissed other people before - not _many_ , and for the most part they’d been girls, too, which Jared isn’t sure he should count anymore given that he’s since learned that he’s not straight. And they were never kisses within a relationship, just spur of the moment things with spur of the moment people, so. 

More or less he was a lot less experienced than he’d made himself out to be. 

And he knew Evan probably was in a similar boat, but oh of _course_ he’d have, at the very least, _somehow,_ a body count that was a positive integer, and he’d somehow choose this _one_ thing to not be nervous about _at all_. 

Or, well. He _is_ nervous, a little, but only because Jared is so painstakingly awkward about everything they do. Which sucks, because Jared _likes_ it, likes him, he just doesn’t know how to fucking act, clearly. 

“You know, in hindsight,” Evan was saying, and Jared could already feel his face _burning_. “I don’t know why I believed you even a little bit when you said in high school that - that you got some every time you were at camp?” 

The asshole also says this while he’s hovering over Jared, and he’s flushed too but he’s still grinning and he’s kind of beautiful and Jared is dying, actually. He’s on the cusp of fucking blacking out and not waking up. Evan shouldn’t be allowed to legally speak to him, in his honest opinion. 

“Am I the dumbass for lying about it, or are you the dumbass for believing me?” Jared asks, carefully draping an arm over his own face so it’s covering his eyes. “The world may never know.” 

“The world knows. I never completely believed you.” 

“We get it Evan, the idea of me being even slightly fuckable is preposterous.” 

He regrets it as soon as he says it, not because he thinks it’s untrue but because Evan’s silence is immediate and while Jared can’t see the look on his face, he can certainly imagine it.

“I didn’t say that,” Evan eventually says, quieter, and the sweeping feeling low in Jared’s gut is no longer a pleasant sensation. He swallows but doesn’t say anything. Evan moves his hand off of where he had it against Jared’s chest. “Jared, I didn’t — I’m sorry—“ 

“ _No_ ,” Jared says probably a little too quickly, grabbing Evan’s wrist and moving his hand back. “I - no, don’t be, I’m just.” He struggles to find any words, let alone the right ones. “Bad. At this.” 

Again, Evan is quiet. He smooths down the front of Jared’s shirt. Jared can hear him take an unsteady breath. “Are you sure that you’re okay with this?” 

“Yes.” 

“Jared.” 

Reluctantly, Jared moves his arm off his face, letting it flop limply next to him on the bed instead. “Yes,” he says again. Evan’s face, while still red, is pinched with concern. 

“Because - you’re allowed to not? If you aren’t comfortable with this then that’s totally fine, and—“ 

“It’s not that,” Jared interrupts him, and - the urge to cover his face again is so strong, not just because this conversation is uncomfortable but because despite what’s happening his brain still needs to remind him how he feels about the image of Evan being on top of him. He shakes himself and takes a breath. “It’s — I want to, seriously. I promise. And it’s not you at all either, it’s literally just that I - I don’t know what I’m doing? At all? And that’s — I feel. Dumb.” Ah yes, very eloquently spoken. He mentally kicks himself, repeatedly. 

Evan considers all of this, eyes searching his carefully. 

Jared hardly passed bio, so he’s not sure how accurate or possible this is, but he’s pretty sure that right now all the blood in his body is just. In his face. 

Evan’s face softens, and he shakes his head. “You aren’t dumb, to start.” 

Jared opens his mouth to speak again, but nothing comes out. So he nods, understandingly, and puts his arm back over his face. 

Evan laughs from above him. “I — _stop_ doing that,” 

“It’s not my fault. You can’t just look at me like that.” 

“I’m not _looking_ at you in a certain way, you’re just being a dork.” The affection makes something squeeze in his chest, and Jared presses his arm more into his face like that will Make That Stop. 

After a moment, he feels Evan shift forward a little, and then his lips are against the inside of Jared’s forearm that’s facing out and his body does like. A full on shudder. And Evan is leaning back and laughing again because he’s the worst and wow Jared _cannot_ stand him.

“You are _killing_ me.”

“I am not.” 

“You can’t tell me whether or not I’m dying.”

“I—“ Evan giggles, and Jared can feel him shake his head again. “What are you even saying right now?” 

Jared moves his arm off his face again, and of course Evan is grinning down at him in the way that he does, and. Butterflies or something are happening in Jared’s stomach and he breathes out, shakily. 

“Hi,” he says, after a moment of just looking up at Evan and being grateful yet again that he hasn’t gone into cardiac arrest. Evan laughs again, softer, more flustered. He drops a bit more of his weight onto Jared, and everywhere they are touching feels electric. 

“Also, I,” Evan starts to say, before scoffing quietly. “Dude, what makes you think I _ever_ know what I’m doing?” 

“Okay, first of all, you just — you seem so fucking _chill_ about it, I don’t know,” Jared says, closing his eyes because that’s the only way he can break their eye contact right now. “Like, you don’t— I know you haven’t slept around and you aren’t much more experienced in anything than I am, but you’re just. You _aren’t_ nervous about it. Ever.” He pauses, scoffing humorlessly. “Which is also not a thing I ever thought I’d say about you.” 

“But that’s.. not true at all?” Evan admits after a second, and Jared would call immediate bullshit if Evan didn’t sound so genuine. “I’m.. you really think that?” 

“Kinda?” Jared says, opening his eyes again. Evan blinks, flushing a little. 

“I don’t — I _am_ nervous, but like..” He’s looking at Jared in a way that’s.. careful. Specific. “.. it’s. It’s you, so.” 

If Jared was being honest, he doesn’t _totally_ know what that means, but it still makes his heart do inexplicable things in his chest. “Oh.” 

“Like — I, um.” Evan starts to elaborate, and yeah, now Jared can see some of the previously mentioned nerves. “It’s just that I. Trust you? A lot? So it’s not.. I just don’t feel as anxious. Doing this. If I’m doing it with you.” He blinks, and then rushes to amend, “Not—Not that it wouldn’t be? Like obviously I’d _only_ be—“ 

“Okay, I get it now, we’re both a mess,” Jared cuts him off with a breathless little laugh, shaking his head and carefully shifting so he can loop his arms around Evan’s neck. It brings Evan’s face closer to his, and they both exchange the same sort of doe-eyed look. 

“Can I..” 

“Yeah,” Jared answers on a breath, and Evan hesitates before he closes the few inches of space between them. 

It’s so much. Jared wishes at times like this that he was like, a writer or something, because nothing he can say really measures up to the feeling that this brings _every_ time, just in general when Evan kisses him, yeah, but especially when it’s like this. When Evan just does it like it’s _easy_ and _thoughtless_ but yet somehow it still feels so deliberate and _calculated_ and. Jared’s glad he’s laying down because he can guarantee he’s too weak to stand. 

All of that is also separate to the fact that now they actually are pressed together, and the electricity feels a little more just like constant sparking.

“What —“ Evan starts to pull away to ask, and Jared has to actively fight the urge to chase his lips. “What was the other thing?”

“Huh?” 

“You said - you said ‘first of all,’ like you had something else for after that.” 

It takes Jared a minute to shake his head from _Evan is kissing me and I’m gay about it_ to even process what he’s talking about, before he blinks. And once he does, and once he remembers, he chokes a little on a laugh. 

“Fucking - I was going to tell you not to call me _dude_ when you’re literally in between my legs.” 

Evan raises his eyebrows, like he just forgot that he’d said that, before a little grin spreads over his face and he’s leaning in again. “What’s wrong with that?” 

“I — you _know_ what’s wrong with that.” 

“No, we’re just —“ He starts to giggle before he even says it, so Jared knows right away that it’s bad. “We’re just guys being dudes, y’know?” 

Jared has to tilt his head down so he doesn’t laugh against Evan’s stupid fucking mouth. “You’re so dumb, shut _up_ ,”

“But _bro_ ,” he continues, bumping their noses, and it’s not like he was being serious before but he’s almost giggling too hard now to even get that much out, and. 

Maybe Jared gets it. Why Evan isn’t anxious when it’s him. Because looking up at Evan now, hardly an inch of space between them and he’s grinning down at Jared like an idiot but his eyes are still so earnest, Jared can only feel, like. Enamored. Wholeheartedly. _God._

“I hate you,” he says, not even a little bit of conviction in it because the words are hardly even words, said on something mixed between a giggle and a breath, and then whatever’s left of that breath is gone in a second anyway, because Evan is kissing him again. 

  
  
  


**iv.**

Jared’s fumbling in one of the drawers behind the counter trying to find that damn VGA to DVI adapter cable he _knew_ was in there because he saw it yesterday when the door leading into the store dings. He holds back a sigh. “Hey, I’ll be with you in just a sec!” He closes the drawer and frowns. Where the fuck was his cable? 

“Take your time,” Evan calls back, and. Wait. Jared blinks several times and then pops up from behind the counter. 

Sure enough, yeah, that’s Evan standing there. Jared does a quick one-over of the store to make sure no one else was there before turning back to Evan, raising a brow.

“Uh, hi?” he says, as well-spoken as ever. “What are you doing here?” 

“Just saying hey,” Evan says flatly, and Jared only just now realizes that his hands were in his hoodie pockets only because he’s now taking them _out,_ and setting something on the counter in between them. “Also, stop leaving your inhaler in my car.” 

Jared blinks down at it. Huh. That’s where it was. 

“I don’t even - I’m _barely_ the one who drives us places, I don’t understand how it keeps getting in there.”

Jared hums, picking it up and sort of flipping it in his hand. “Shit, yeah, sorry.” He sighs. “You’re right though, I _really_ could’ve used this earlier.” 

Evan’s eyes immediately bug out of his head, almost a little comically, and Jared can’t keep a straight face for any more than three seconds. “I’m _kidding,_ I’m kidding. I’m fine.” 

Evan blinks, and then scowls at him. “Dick,” he mumbles, rolling his eyes. “Anyway, uh. That was it.” He gestures to Jared’s very empty store. “I’ll let you get back to work since you’re, you’re obviously very busy.” 

He starts to turn, before Jared sort of glances at the inhaler again and then back up. “Wait, hey, Evan?” 

Evan stops and looks back at him, already halfway to the door again. “Yeah?” 

“Did you - you didn’t come here just to bring me this, did you?” 

Evan pauses, kind of regarding him for a second, before shaking his head. “Nah. It was on the way. I have class soon, so..” 

“Oh. Right.” 

“Yeah.” He shifts awkwardly on his feet for a minute, before nodding once and offering Jared a little wave. “I gotta get going to that, so. I’ll see you.” 

“Right, yeah. Bye,” He calls back, and Evan turns back around to leave. Jared watches him go, still looking towards the door even after it closes after him. 

He glances down at the inhaler still in his hands after a couple of seconds, turning it over thoughtfully. 

“That’s so sweet,” he hears from next to him, and he _jumps_ because Jesus Christ when did Alana get there? Jared nearly dropped the inhaler in the process, sort of fumbling it in his hands and catching it again at the last second. 

“Jesus, ‘Lana, where did you fucking _come from?”_

“The break room,” she answers, and he can’t tell if she’s actually chipper or if she’s being sarcastic. Jared scoffs, stuffing the inhaler into his back pocket and turning back around to return to his search. 

“You heard us talking and you didn’t even say hi? Creep.”

“I was busy making a label for _someone’s_ cable they threw into the clearance bin for some reason,” she says flatly despite the grin still on her face, dropping the cord that Jared hadn’t even noticed was even in her hand onto the counter. He gasps, and - yep, that’s it. 

“Wait, _that’s_ where it—?! Actually, you know what, nevermind,” He snatches it up. “Thank you. I take it all back. You’re the best.” 

“Aww,” She turns around and kneels, starting to sift through and put back together one of the drawers that Jared ripped up looking for said stupid cable. “It’s no problem. Just - maybe don’t put it in there, next time? Especially when we had to order it ourselves in the first place.”

He’s already walking over to the disconnected monitor in question that needed the cable. It’s an old ass model that someone brought in last week for them to tamper with, despite Jared flatly telling them that VGA was practically obsolete and there was probably nothing they could do to make it work again if something was wrong with the monitor itself, and Alana trying to persuade them towards buying literally any of the other monitors they had here. 

“You’re allowed to call me out on being a dumbass. Just this one time, though,” Jared says as he turns the monitor around so the back is facing him.

“You weren’t! It was an accident, Jared.” 

“I can’t believe you’re passing up the opportunity to call me a dumbass.”

He can hear her snort, and then the clattering of her sorting through the drawer. “It’s okay. Evan already did it for me, that can count.” 

“Evan called me a dick, not a dumbass. Keep up.” 

Upon fucking with the monitor and trying the cable in every possible way that he can, it still won’t turn on with the computer. Which is annoying. And reaffirms the fact that it’s the monitor itself that’s shit, not any of the cables associated with it. 

“We’re gonna have to call this dude. There’s - I _told_ you guys, this wasn’t going to do anything.” 

Alana, at this point having finished up with the drawers, joins him with a frown. “Oh no, I believed you. Telling him we’d look at it seemed like it was going to get him out of the store faster than me convincing him that a monitor from the last ten years was a safer bet, though.” Jared groans in response, pulling the cord out of the monitor. Damn. 

“Well, if anyone is trying to hit up the local campus tech store in search of some archaic computer monitor cables, we got ‘em covered,” he mumbles. “Only one, though. It’s a hot commodity.” 

“Maybe you had the right idea putting this in the clearance bin, actually,” Alana comments, taking the cord from him and starting to roll it back up. 

The day continues to drag on - they end up calling the guy, who seems less than pleased that they couldn’t get his stupid monitor to turn on (“No, it still won’t turn on, yes, we tried that, no, there’s really nothing else we can do”), a girl Jared was pretty sure used to be in his Theory of Computation class before she flunked out and changed her major to Communication came in and bought a laptop case, and after standing around for way too long Jared eventually grabbed his own laptop from his bag and started working on homework because he was _that_ fucking bored. He thinks Alana follows suit - when he glances over she’s also leaning against the counter dutifully doing something on her iPad. It looks like some kind of spreadsheet. 

“You know,” She says after a while, breaking the quiet that’d fallen over them. “I had no idea you had asthma.” 

Jared glances up at her from his laptop screen, before humming and looking back down at it again. “Oh, yeah. It’s not bad.” A pause. He furrows his brow, grinning a little lopsidedly. “Er, well. It’s _kinda_ bad, but it doesn’t come up very often?”

She doesn’t say anything, and when he looks back up at him she’s regarding him with A Look. He shrugs. 

“Like - okay, ninety percent of the time I’m perfectly fine, but sometimes it gets triggered by really weird shit, and when it does, it’s like. Bad. Hence the inhaler.” 

“Oh.” She returns her attention back to her iPad. “Well, it’s sweet that Evan brought it for you on his way, then. Even if you don’t think it’s that serious.” 

“Mm.” He closes his laptop and stretches back in his chair. “I think it’s - I kind of freaked him out, once, so now he’s really paranoid about me not having it.” 

She raises an eyebrow but doesn’t look up. “Yeah?” 

“Mhm. When we first moved into the apartment, I accidentally left my inhaler at my parent’s house, and we were walking back from campus one day and I started having an asthma attack.” He cringes a little at the memory. “ _I_ don’t remember it being that bad, but Evan says that it was. But he also didn’t know that I had asthma, which. Might’ve also added to the panic. Because he didn’t know what was wrong with me.” 

“What? Haven’t you guys been friends since you were little? How did he not know?” 

“It never came up?” Jared laughed a little at Alana’s expression and shrugged again. “I also didn’t know about it until I was, like, fifteen, so. And it wasn’t bad enough that I felt like I _had_ to tell him.” He sighed. “But, yeah. Ever since then, he makes me carry it with me.” It sounds a little silly and a little embarrassing saying it out loud, but. Of anyone, he doubts that Alana would dig at him about that. 

“For _good_ reason! I would too,” she says, proving his point. “It doesn’t matter how often they happen, they can still happen.” 

“Hey, I already have him on me about it, you can _chill.”_ She just laughs in response, rolling her eyes. Types something else onto her spreadsheet. 

Jared’s eyes flit to the door of the shop - it’s a glass door, so he can see outside. The sun is a little lower in the sky than it was earlier, and upon glancing at the clock above the door, it reads 5:15pm. Evan should be out of class soon. 

Which. 

...

Hold on. Actually. 

It makes him think. 

“‘Lana?” Jared asks, and she glances up. 

“Yes?” 

“What.. it’s _Thursday_ , right?” 

“..Yes?” And when he only nods slowly, and then kind of grins at the ground, she tilts her head. “Why do you ask?” 

He looks back up at the door and rolls his eyes. Not because of her. And anyway, despite himself he’s still sort of grinning. “Evan doesn’t have any classes today.” 

It takes Alana a couple of seconds to remember why that’s of any importance, but once she does Jared can hear the smile in her voice. “Oh. I don’t know if I should call him sweet for going out of his way for you, or you for knowing his exact schedule.”

Jared flushes a little, this time rolling his eyes _at_ her. “We live together, it’s not that hard to remember what days he’s there and what days he isn’t.” 

“Okay. Well. Then I think _he’s_ very sweet,” she clarifies. 

“Me too,” Jared mumbles to himself after a moment.

———

“So,” Jared leans precariously over the back of the couch to peer down at Evan’s laptop screen. “What all do you have left to do?” 

“Oh, um. Not much,” Evan shuts his laptop and sets it aside, starting to dig through his backpack sitting on the floor. “I’m supposed to read a chapter of this book for my Lit class, but.” He yawns, pulling aforementioned book out. “I think that’s it.” 

“Cool,” Yawning is contagious, so Jared yawns as well before pushing himself back up and walking around to actually sit on the couch too.

Evan had started leafing through the book, but he paused when he saw Jared sit down. He raised a brow. “I thought you were going to bed?” 

“I was—” _waiting for you_ almost finished that sentence off. “I. Yeah, in a little bit.” He can tell that he didn’t need to say what he thought for Evan to still know, anyway, judging by the look on his face, so Jared naturally changes the subject. “You don’t use a bookmark? You just _remember_ what page you were on?” 

Evan laughs a little. “Yeah?”

“Fucking _animal._ ” 

“You know, you seem like the type of person who’d dog-ear pages, so I don’t wanna hear it.” 

“First of all, you can’t judge my character on a fact that you just _made up_ and _think_ is true, and secondly, excluding textbooks, I can’t remember the last time I actually read from a physical book.”

Evan just hums in response, which Jared figures is the only response he’s going to get. 

A couple of seconds later though he hears Evan mumble, “I don’t blame you,” which makes Jared glance up from his phone that he’d since picked up. 

“Huh?” 

And he doesn’t think Evan meant to say that out loud, judging by the look on his face afterwards. “Oh - nothing, I’m. It’s nothing. Sorry.” 

Jared raises an eyebrow, still looking back at him. And after a few seconds, he would’ve figured that by now Evan would, like, look away from him and try to avoid him by pretending to read the book but he. Doesn’t. It actually seems like he’s waiting for Jared to stop paying attention to him first. Jared blinks a few times, and then kind of cranes his head a little to look at the page before Evan realizes what he’s doing, and. 

The text on there is, like. Obscenely small. Or at least way too small for a Lit book, in Jared’s opinion. 

“Dude, wait, what the _fuck?”_ Jared does a little bit of a double take, but then Evan’s pulling the book towards him enough that Jared can’t see the pages anymore. “That’s - the words are so _tiny!_ ”

“Yeah,” Evan sort of laughs awkwardly, uncomfortably, shrugging. Jared frowns, scooting a little closer, and Evan’s grin sort of falters as he puts the book back down for Jared to look at it again.

“I can hardly read that and I _don’t_ have dyslexia,” he says, and again Evan sort of just shrugs. Jared furrows his brow. “How do you - how have you been reading this?” 

“It just takes a long time,” Evan mumbles. “And I usually also look at Spark Notes afterwards in case I missed something?” He watches compliantly as Jared takes the book off of his lap. “It’s - It really isn’t a big deal.” 

Jared leafs through the chapter. There’s only about seven pages, with how small the words are. “How long does it usually take you to read one?” 

“I dunno, like, forty-five minutes..?” 

“I could read this to you in, like. Twenty.” When he glances back up at Evan, he’s flushing, but not in the good way. Jared blinks, and then tries again. “It would just be easier? And faster? And you’d probably understand it better?” He pauses, and then adds, “And I don’t care, y’know, I’m not doing anything else right now.” 

Evan looks conflicted, brows pinched together and his eyes flickering from the book to his own lap again. “I mean, you don’t _have_ to—”

“I know,” Jared says, probably a little too quickly, and Evan looks up at him again. Jared shifts a little, shrugging. _I want to._ “I can, though.”

Evan doesn’t say anything, so Jared looks back down at the book and leans back against the couch. Hesitantly flips back to the beginning of the chapter. “I can do dumb voices for the characters if you want,” he offers, and he hears Evan try to turn his laugh into a cough. 

“Feel free,” Evan says, and his voice is still a little small because he’s probably still embarrassed, but. Hopefully not as much as before. The last thing Jared wanted was for the offer to sound like he was implying that Evan _couldn’t_ read it himself, because, like. He could. Clearly he had been.

“There’s no audiobooks for this?” Jared asks as that thought pops into his mind, but Evan shakes his head. 

“I couldn’t find one.”

“That’s dumb,” he mumbles, and Evan makes a vague sound of agreement. Shaking his head, Jared picks the book up and clears his throat. “Okay. It’s been a minute since I’ve read out loud for the class, so. Don’t make fun of me.” 

*

[9:14am]

_hey_

_ur personal email is still the same, right?_

[9:16am]

_Yes?_

_Why do you ask?_

[9:16am]

_i sent u a thing_

_ur book wasn’t on audible, which is cursed by itself but_

_i found a vers of it somewhere else_

_it should work?? but it might not just lmk_

[9:22am] 

_The download link looked extremely sketchy, but it worked! :)_

[9:22am]

_hell yeah!!!_

_i did have to like. kind of pirate it a little but_

_book is old af, the government isn’t gonna care enough to come for us_

[9:25am]

_I love living a life of crime._

_Thaaank you x_

[9:25am]

_yeah ofc x_

  
  


**v.**

The first thing that Jared registers upon kind of waking up is that the little bit of light entering their room via their window isn’t from daylight, but from the reflection of all the fucking _snow_ outside. 

Which makes sense, because it definitely doesn’t feel like it should be daytime yet. He didn’t wake up because of his alarm or anything, he just happened to wake up randomly for a moment and got distracted from trying to fall back asleep by, again, the snow outside, and also by the fact that his bed was missing an entire Evan. 

He made a sort of discomforted noise as he sat up, squinting towards their bedroom window. Which proved to be mostly useless because he couldn’t see shit without his glasses, but from what he _could_ see, there was just. A lot of white out there. 

He rolled over and reached towards the night stand, batting at it until he had his glasses and phone in hand. He slipped his glasses on and then immediately was cringing at both the brightness of his phone screen and the time - 5:24am. His first class wasn’t until, like. 10am. 

Or, well. In theory. He glances to the window again now that he can actually see - it’s not too much different from when he couldn’t, but it does reaffirm that yes, there’s a lot of fucking snow outside, and it is still coming down. Kind of hard. If he listens close enough, he can hear the wind shaking the fence outside. 

Class should get cancelled, right? He’s not entirely awake right now, but he’s pretty sure that 9am Jared is going to be pissed if he has to walk _or_ drive in this shit. 

The creaking of their stairs and the padding down the hall has Jared glancing up, and a moment later Evan is walking back into their room. He doesn’t notice Jared is awake right away, gauging by the way he’s sort of just standing a couple of feet past the doorway, rubbing at one of his eyes and squinting sleepily at the window. 

“Hey,” Jared says for some reason, instead of, like. Any other greeting. Evan starts a little, gaze immediately jumping over to Jared, before he blinks a couple of times and relaxes again.

“Hi,” he says back. “They cancelled classes for today. Go back to sleep.” 

That saved him having to check his email, but he still blinks back at Evan. “How long have you been up?” 

Evan yawns, padding over to the window and attempting to close the curtains more than they already were. “Like, uh. Since 4:30, or somethin’.” He manages to close off some of the light getting into the room, before yawning again. “Couldn’t sleep.” 

“Oh.” 

He’s just _slightly_ more awake now to sort of take in Evan’s appearance a little. He’s wearing the obnoxious pair of sweatpants with their university’s logo all down the one side and one of Jared’s old CIT sweatshirts, and his hair is sort of laying flat but also sticking up in a few weird spots because he hasn’t done anything to it yet today and he just looks. Soft. He thinks part of it is due to the fact that he didn’t fall asleep with Evan here because he’d been visiting with Heidi and clearly didn’t get back until after Jared fell asleep, but Jared, like. Really needs him to be closer to him than he is right now. 

“Are you doing anything?” 

Evan blinks slowly at him for a second, before raising a brow and offering a very sleepy yet somehow bastardish smile. “Yes Jared, I have. _So much_ to do at 5-something ‘n the morning.” 

He ignores that, flopping back down on the bed but keeping one arm raised, grabbing at air. “Come here.” 

Evan laughs quietly but obliges. The bed dips under his weight once he sits down, and he tugs the blankets back to join Jared underneath them. He reaches out and flicks the frame of Jared’s glasses, murmuring to ‘take these off’, before lying down next to him.

Jared starts to, pulling them halfway off his face before stopping. 

“What?” Evan mumbles, watching him do this. 

“I - you said that classes were cancelled?”

“Mmhm.” 

“Because the roads are - like - bad?” 

“Yeah.” 

“ _Fuck._ ” Jared still takes his glasses off, but after he sets them haphazardly back on the nightstand he rubs frustratedly at his eyes. “I was gonna go to the store today. Because we’re out of, like. Everything.” 

“Oh.” Evan pauses thoughtfully for a minute, before Jared feels him touch his arm, probably trying to pull it away from his face. “No, we’re fine, I went last night.” 

Jared pulls his hands away, looking over at him. “Huh?” 

“I went to the store after I left Mom’s house, that’s why I was gone for so long,” he said through another yawn. “We’re fine.” 

Jared blinks. Pauses for another long moment. “Wait - really?” 

Evan laughs quietly, probably at his incredulity. “Do you not believe me? You wanna go check?” 

He doesn’t respond for a second before just shaking his head, and again Evan sort of giggles sleepily at him before just holding out an arm. Jared scoots closer until they’re tangled up again. 

“Thank you. For doing that,” he eventually mumbles into Evan’s shirt, and Evan sort of just hums in response. 

“Mhm.”

“I hate driving in this shit.” 

“I know.” 

“You’re great.” And then, “I love you.” 

He feels Evan tense, and that ends up waking Jared up more than the realization of what he said does, which doesn’t even come until Evan shifts back a little to look at him. 

“That’s the first time you’ve ever said that,” he says gently, and immediately Jared is wide eyed and pulling away a little in panic and not even stopping to try and read Evan’s expression. 

“I - shit, fuck, I— I didn’t mean that,” Wait, fuck, _what?_ That’s not right either. “I - wait, no? I _do,_ I do mean that, but, like—” 

“Jared.” 

Jared closes his mouth. 

Evan sort of looks between his eyes for a second. “I love you too.” 

It makes Jared’s heart ache, but he’s not sure in what kind of way. He looks back at Evan for a second before looking down, and hardly a couple of seconds later Evan’s nudging at his chin with a knuckle. “Hey. What’s wrong?”

Jared closes his eyes and sort of breathes out a humorless, frustrated scoff of a laugh. “I didn’t want the first time I said it to be when I was fucking half asleep.” 

Evan sort of considers that for a minute. Even just the little bit of silence is killing Jared, so he ends up looking back at him after a couple of seconds to see Evan sort of. Like. Looking at him, kind of amused. Which is so fucking _frustrating_ because Jared fucked it up, right, why does Evan think it’s _funny_ —

“Do you still mean it, though?”

It takes Jared aback. And it also takes a second for him to answer. “I—I mean, _yeah,_ of course.” 

“Then why does it matter?” 

Well. That’s a good question. One that Jared doesn’t have the answer to, partially asleep or not. Evan can tell as much, because he shakes his head and traces over Jared’s cheek with his thumb. 

“I’m not - like. I’m not gonna _not_ love you back just because you didn’t wait until the perfect moment to tell me for the first time.” 

Jared flushes, reaching up to hold Evan’s hand there. “I—I mean. I know.” 

“It wasn’t going to change my mind one way or another.” 

When Jared doesn’t say anything in response, Evan sighs softly, shifting just a little bit closer. He takes his time saying what he does next, averting his eyes from Jared’s face. “I’ve known that I have, for. For a while. So.” 

The ache is a good one now, Jared is pretty sure. It takes him a moment, but he breathes out a little shallowly and nods. “Yeah, I. Me too.” He’s known for so long. _So_ fucking long. 

Evan’s eyes immediately flit up and he lets out a breath that sounds a little bit like a laugh. “Well. There you go.” 

Jared kind of just. Looks back at him for a second, carefully. Because even after all of this time, sometimes he’s really just convinced that this boy isn’t real. But, of course, Evan looks right back at him. With his face and his eyes and his hair that’s sticking up. 

“I love you,” Jared murmurs again, hardly even audible. 

Evan flushes - Jared can hardly see it because it’s so dark in the room and because he’s without glasses, but it’s there. 

“I love you,” Evan says back, just as quietly, and it hits Jared a little different now that he isn’t in full out panic mode. His heart still does something stupid in his chest, but obviously it’s for a different reason now. 

A couple of seconds of stillness after that, Evan saves him from having to say anything else. He shifts, and Jared easily lets himself be moved so he’s pressed against Evan’s chest again. And of course the inevitable thoughts of the aftermath of all that still buzz around in Jared’s head for a bit, but thankfully not for very long, given that he’s already so tired. 

Evan knows. He keeps coming back to that. 

He’s known, hopefully, but Jared can say for sure now that he _knows._

Which, on its own, is a comforting enough thought to get him back to sleep, now accompanied by the lingering mental note of saying it better sometime after they wake up. 

**Author's Note:**

> \- i've only seen the secret life of an american teenager once, and am judging degrassi solely based on the vibes ppl my age say it has bc i've never seen it dljsgnsdag
> 
> \- i've rode on a subway like twice, i apologize if i said anything weird or dumb :'D
> 
> \- the 'stupid pins' are 100% pins i've seen before, and let me tell you seeing the easter one on someone's bag unironically? almost put me under
> 
> \- fun fact this all started because i wrote the long anecdote for physical and then. accidentally wrote a bunch more and then accidentally made it a fic
> 
> \- i've only written alana like twice?? which is fairly obvious and i'm Sorry
> 
> \- i don't know if the love languages have a specific order?? if they don't, just for clarity, i wrote it as quality time, receiving gifts, physical touch, acts of service, and words of affirmation 
> 
> come bug me on tumblr!! and thank you for reading :D https://kkamikazed.tumblr.com/


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